Page 90 of Death of the Glass Angel
Ripping the display case open, Des pried the strange ornament free, holding it in both hands as she gazed at her reflection, appearing both in the glass bulb and the wings. Silence blanketed her mind and the room before something struck her in the chest.
It felt like she had been thrown backward, yet her body did not budge. Pain ripped at her head, an indescribable tearing. She nearly dropped the glass angel as the woman named Des receded into her mind, and the woman named Janus assumed the reins.
* * *
Felsin had many problems. Namely, the cat poking its head from his bag and the half-dead man leaning on his arm.
Should his cat be crushed or split by an axe, Felsin would never forgive himself. Why had he taken Sors?
Frantic men scrambled to escape the underground ruins, leaping over worktables and crawling beneath tables as they desperately fled from the creature hovering in the room’s center. The thing hardly budged as it threw men about like playthings—hands, draped in tattered white cloth, shot through the mirrored water, grabbing men and dashing them against the cavern walls. Broken bones cracked against stone, and bodies slumped to the floor.
Leaning Talon against the entrance hall, Felsin jogged forward, observing the chaos as a workbench was picked up and thrown in his direction. Covering his head, he threw himself to the ground, hearing the bench crash a few feet behind him.
As he shot to his feet, he saw a familiar woman sidling the wall, approaching a closed door across the room. Lady Mela. The woman who had stood beneath the dragon in Alfaris’ reading.
She pointed at the door, mouthing a single word. ‘Janus.’
The door burst open as a man in brown rushed out, bewildered. A blur of blue streaked behind Felsin as Talon raced for the open door, shoving past the man into the hall.
A phantom tendril raced between Felsin’s boots, grabbing the overturned work table behind him and lobbing it at Felsin’s head. Diving backward this time, Felsin skidded across the floor as the worktable rolled across the ground, its metal bending with the impact.
Spirits. Scrambling to his feet, Felsin dashed after Talon but saw another phantom hand reaching for the battered bench. Throwing himself against the wall, he barely escaped being crushed as the mirage evoker tossed the workbench toward the door, slamming it against the stone.
Backing away from the door, Felsin stared up at the mirage evoker, meeting blazing, glassy eyes, though the remainder of its head might as well have been hidden in a cloud of shadow, such an intense, unnatural blur hung about its form.
Something changed in those eyes when they met Felsin’s. It looked. . . pleased. One of its metallic arms, swathed in tattered white cloth, rose to its eyes, the blur fading about its hands long enough to make a single gesture. It pointed two fingers at Felsin before turning them onto its glassy eyes, voicelessly sharing a clear message.
Eyes on me.
The shrouding illusion coated the figure’s arm, smudging its finer details as the creature raised a hand to the ceiling. When Felsin first encountered this thing, it had been imposing and frightening.
Now, the light of the forges allowed him to see it. An undeniable arrogance colored its movements, the kind of effortless grace he would expect of someone both vain and talented. Every motion came with unnecessary theatrics—made by those who cared overmuch about appearances.
This thing was no monster—it was human.
Consumed with ardent curiosity, Felsin did precisely as it commanded, watching its every movement with rapt attention.
The figure’s hand slowly twirled into a fist, before it yanked its arm down. The earth above its head shattered and broke as though pulled down by invisible ropes. Schisms appeared in the stone ceiling, snaking across the roof and traveling down the pillars supporting the cave. Chunks of rock fell, thudding into the floor.
Sors meowed angrily as Felsin leaped to his feet, struggling to balance in the quaking chamber. He closed the remaining gap between himself and the door Talon had disappeared into.
A man in dark purple robes burst from the hall behind them, flanked by two guards in steel armor. Sheer awe colored his face as he noticed the mirage evoker, and he stuttered out an order, one hand pointing in Felsin’s direction.
“Stop them!”
Perhaps the soldiers would have responded quicker had the creature in the room not given them pause. Despite their commander’s order, the men’s attention fell instead upon the room’s destruction and the broken bodies. Time enough passed in their hesitation for the evoker in purple to regain his senses.
His fingers shone with white light. Felsin raised his hands, preparing to block whatever spell the man conjured, but felt something wrap around his ankle, yanking him to the floor before dragging him across the mirrored puddles. Jagged rocks dug into him, ripping his coat and pants as he was pulled across the room into the tunnel leading to the entrance.
Mela slammed into the tunnel walls behind him, and Felsin noticed a tendril release her leg. The mirage evoker drifted from the room’s center, planting itself firmly between the evoker and their group. Felsin stared at the fluttering white of its back.
Had it protected them?
“Shit.” Mela hissed, dragging herself to her feet. She was injured, favoring her left leg.
A table-sized chunk of the roof collapsed from above, landing to Felsin’s right, blocking his view of the door Talon had slipped through.
To return would kill them both. Felsin looked up to see a section of the roof dislodge itself directly above their heads. Grabbing the red-haired woman, he hastily summoned an earthen dome.
